India “curing” inactive DTH pay-TV subs?

The latest data from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) seems to indicate that – at long last – the nation’s many “inactive” DTH TV subscriptions may not be quite as severe as thought.

India’s six giant DTH operators submit their quarterly numbers to TRAI and in the quarter-year to December 31st the overall inactive subscriber count was 28.8 million. This is still a huge number but is significantly less than the September 30th 2015 number which stood at a massive 40.4 million.

The overall DTH subscription base (active plus inactive) now stands at 84.8 million (as at December 31st 2015), up from 81.47 (September 30th 2015). In other words ‘active’ subs now count as 66 per cent of the total base, compared with just 50.4 per cent at September 30th last year.